


Hold Your Fire and Clear Your Mind

by planarities



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Post-Season/Series 05, Raven-centric, spacekru
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-27
Updated: 2018-11-27
Packaged: 2019-08-30 02:27:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,751
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16756123
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/planarities/pseuds/planarities
Summary: It doesn't matter that neither of them can breathe. Saving the human race doesn’t stop just because two of its members are gone. The Universe doesn’t mourn.Maybe it should. Just this once.**After another pointless war and decisions that come at a cost, they have to deal with everything they've lost.Day One, from Raven's perspective.





	Hold Your Fire and Clear Your Mind

Raven wakes up to a grey ceiling and the soft hum of a spaceship.

For a moment she thinks she’s back on the Ark, dread creeping up her spine because it’s been years and she still hasn’t cracked the fuel problem, but then she remembers.

The war, the bombs, and the end of the world. Again.

She sits up.

Bellamy’s slumped on the floor beside her, back leaned against an empty pod, hugging his knees. He must have been there for some time before he decided to bring her back to life. His mouth is stretched into a smile, but his eyes are sad.

‘What’s wrong,’ Raven asks, dread pooling in her stomach. A twitch of pain flashes through her leg when she tries to move.

Bellamy sits up straighter, his hands dropping to his sides. ‘Raven,’ he starts, measured, and her eyes dart over the room, looking for signs of what went wrong. It’s quiet. Too quiet. On both sides of the long hall bodies lie behind frozen glass, unmoving, just like she remembers.

Bellamy’s sigh snaps her attention back to him. ‘It’s been longer than we anticipated.’

She meets his gaze head-on, not daring to breathe, her mind spinning with possibilities. ‘How long?’

‘There were complications, and the Earth-‘

‘How long, Bellamy?’

She stares him down, urging him to just rip the band-aid off. She needs to know how bad it is, so she can fix it.  He picks himself up from the floor and stands before her. Finally, he relents, ‘Hundred and twenty-five years.’

It takes a moment for his words to register, but then she lets out a breath, just a little. Ultimately – ten years, a hundred years – it doesn’t even matter. They’re the last ones, there’s nothing else out there, so it’s not like they missed anything important. The world hasn’t gone on without them because it doesn’t exist outside of this ship anymore, at least not in the way that matters.

But Bellamy’s avoiding her eyes. There’s something else. Something that has the power to make his hand come up behind his neck and rub the skin hard enough to leave an angry red mark.

She swings her legs over the edge of her cot, lets them dangle just above the metal floor. Her leg will hurt when she finally steps on it. But whatever Bellamy’s holding back will hurt more.

‘Monty and Harper are gone.’

Raven grips the edge of her cot, heart caught in her throat. His words are like a punch to her gut, her mind scrambling to understand what they mean.

Monty and Harper are gone.

She can’t fix that.

She doesn’t even have to ask for clarification. Bellamy’s eyes are red from crying, but he’s not panicked, or worried, or blaming himself for some danger they haven’t foreseen. He’s almost at peace with it. 

‘They have a son,’ he says quietly, and she lifts her head in surprise, even though it makes sense. Her mind provides her with a vague image of a little boy with Monty’s bright eyes and Harper’s kind smile, and then goes back to what Bellamy said just moments ago. Hundred and twenty-five years. The numbers don’t add up.

‘ _Have?_ ’

Bellamy nods. ‘He’s the one who woke us up.’

Of course. He must have been in cryo too.

Out of the corner of her eye, Raven notices movement down the hall, right over Bellamy’s shoulder. A flash of blond hair and a hand hovering over the doorway. She looks up to find Clarke staring at her, eyes wide and sad, frozen in spot like she can’t decide whether to come in or bolt.

A surge of resentment rushes through Raven, and she has to bite her tongue to hold onto things she wants to say, none of them pretty. It may have been a century, but images of a gun pointed at her and everything that followed are still fresh in her mind. If she hadn’t sold them out to McCreary, if she hadn’t warned him about the eye in the sky, then maybe Monty and Harper wouldn’t be gone.

Clarke still hasn’t moved, her eyes watery and her mouth pressed into a thin line like she _understands_. Raven’s nails dig painfully into the smooth material of the pod.

Clarke _doesn’t_ understand. If she did, then none of them would have ended up here.

Thankfully, Clarke seems to read something along those lines on Raven’s face, since her shoulder sag just a little before she retreats from Raven’s view and disappears back to where she came from.

Good. Raven can’t deal with that right now.

She brings her focus back to Bellamy. His fingers twitch nervously by his thigh, the gesture reminiscent of the restless, fidgety Bellamy who paced in his room all night for the first two weeks back on the Ark. A tear slides down his cheek, and he lets it drop from his chin instead of quickly brushing it away with the back of his hand.

Raven hops off her pod, ignoring the pain in her leg, and wraps her arms around his neck, tugging him down and running her hand soothingly through his hair. His palms press against her back as he leans into her, and Raven staggers under his weight, just for a moment. She closes her eyes and digs her fingers into his firm shoulder, desperate for something to hold onto while Monty’s words echo through her mind. _This is our last chance, Raven. Either we wake up and do better, or… we may as well not bother at all._

Except he’s not waking up beside her right now, is he. He left it all in their hands. Her hands.

She tightens her grip on Bellamy. She’s furious at Monty and Harper for choosing to grow old without them, even though her chest hurts because _she understands_. She wants to unleash hell on Clarke for the way she backed away just now, too afraid to face the faint red marks that she may as well put on Raven’s neck herself. She’s mad at pointless wars and the damn valley, but most of all – she’s mad at herself. If only she thought of something quicker, acted before everything went to hell, then maybe she wouldn’t be here at all, or at least not like this. Mourning two of her closest friends as each of Bellamy’s silent sobs rips the heart out of her chest, again and again.

She doesn’t know how much time passes before Bellamy takes a shaky breath and disentangles himself from her arms. When he steps back, his eyes are clear, his hands are steady. He looks determined.  

‘There’s something else you need to know.’

-

‘You know, I haven’t thanked you yet for waking me up,’ she says, leaning against the doorway of a small room that’s tucked against the main area of the ship. Bellamy’s seated in front of the large windows looking out to the mysterious planet and its two suns.

He doesn’t need to ask how she found him. She doesn’t need to ask if she can sit down beside him. They both have enough memories of all those times they sat on the floor of the observation deck on the Ark, watching the Earth spin lazily under their feet.

She knew he’d be looking for a place like this to compose himself after their long, somber talk with newly awoken Emori, Murphy and Echo. They’ve decided to hold off waking up anyone who’s not strictly necessary before they learn more about the ship’s condition after decades of unsupervised travel, as well as the planet below them. Even more importantly, Bellamy suggested they postpone any other decision-making until tomorrow, and they all wholeheartedly agreed. Today is just not that kind of day. They need to remember how to breathe first.

She sees him smile in the reflection in the window as she saunters inside.

‘Who else would we wake up? Your name will always be the first on the list.’

He means it, and, theoretically, she knows that he’s got her back, but hearing it still makes something flicker inside of her. They’ve been through so much, and she’s come so far from that scorned girl who crashed and burned once she reached the Ground, then swore not to depend on anyone ever again. Nowadays, it’s nice to know that she doesn’t have to, but she _can_.

Bellamy looks over his shoulder when she doesn’t respond for a while. There’s a crease beginning to form between his eyebrows, like he’s going over her statement in his head and doesn’t like where it leads. She sits down next to him, knowing very well how that line of thinking ends with him second-guessing himself.

‘I know _you_ need me to survive,’ she assures him, attempting to lighten the mood. He doesn’t buy it, his narrowed eyes examining her closely, searching for an answer.

‘Then what-‘

She tilts her head, and sees the moment it dawns on him, his eyes widening. ‘You mean Clarke? Why wouldn’t she-‘

‘We didn’t exactly have the happiest reunion,’ Raven shrugs, keeping her tone light even as resentment simmers under her skin. ‘If I remember correctly she was moments away from shooting my head off because I was taking the collar off Madi’s neck.’

Bellamy opens and closes his mouth like he keeps changing his mind about what to he wants to say.  She can see that he doesn’t want to talk about it. _Well,_ _too bad._ She holds his gaze, refusing to back down. Finally, he sighs, throwing his head back and closing his eyes for a moment.

‘What do you want me to do, Raven? Blame her for protecting her kid? That’s what I’ve been doing since the day we met.’

Raven knew it would come to this. Bless his big, dumb heart.

Before she can say anything, Bellamy runs a hand through his hair. ‘Listen, it’s been hundred and twenty-five years-’

‘It’s been six hours.’

‘Oh, so now _you_ are disregarding scientific facts?’ Bellamy gives her a look, but she knows she’s right. And he knows it too.

She holds his gaze until he sighs again, rubbing his face like the pressure is already gnawing at him. Raven hates to see those lines of worry and the exhausted droop of his shoulders again.

‘She left you for dead and then sold us all out to McCreary,’ she says, memories of the searing pain and the blood trickling down Shaw’s neck making her hands ball into fists at her sides. She clears her throat. ‘For the record, I’m not saying you should throw her off the ship or anything. I just don’t want you to get hurt,’ she admits, bumping her shoulder against his in an attempt to bring him out of his thoughts.

He ducks his head, smiling just a little, and she calls it a win. He finally meets her eyes. ‘I appreciate your concern, but I’m fine. I know things have changed. But we also can’t keep living in the past. We’ve been given another chance and I’m not allowing anyone or anything to screw that up.’

‘Sounds like a lot to take on by yourself.’

He raises his eyebrows. ‘ _Am I_ by myself?’

Like he even needs to ask that. ‘No,’ she begrudgingly admits, shaking her head at his pleased expression. On the other side of the glass, two suns move in tandem over the horizon of their new home. She knows they’re both thinking of the last time they faced a similar sight together, right at the start of one of the happiest chapters of her life. Maybe today can be that too.

Bellamy gives her shoulder a squeeze and picks himself up from the floor. Raven watches over her shoulder as he goes to the doorway, where he stops and turns to have one more look at the sight outside. His expression is guarded, his throat bobbing as he swallows hard.

Raven turns towards him. ‘You okay?’

‘Monty and Harper are gone.’

Every single time it’s like another punch to her gut. She’s not sure how many more she can take.

‘Yes,’ she hears herself say, but the words coming out of her mouth don’t feel true, not yet.

Still, he nods, looking a little lost and at the same time a bit better. The silence stretches on. Finally, he shifts on his feet before announcing his next step. ‘I’ll go see how everyone’s doing.’

‘Okay,’ she says, and knows exactly what hers will be. ‘I’m gonna wake Shaw up.’

‘Okay.’

She stands up once she can’t hear his footsteps anymore and goes to press her palm against the cold glass. Clouds swirl in unfamiliar patterns over the planet on the other side, unrestrained and free. She stays there, just for a moment, before taking a deep breath and heading straight to the cryo-room.

She’s grateful that Bellamy didn’t object, even though she was ready to argue that they’ll need Shaw’s expertise to figure out their next move. But she knows that’s not the only reason why she’s on her way to wake him up.

It may have been over a hundred years since they all – _not all_ , she remembers, her chest pierced by a pang of pain, _not everyone_ – went to sleep. But for her, it’s been a couple of hours since she last talked to him.

For the most part, wonkru seemed assured by a twelve-year old kid that it’s going to be fine, and the prisoners had already gone through it and come out alive. That left her and her family, the last living remains of the damned hundred, to exchange resigned glances in the corner. Bellamy gave her a reassuring hug while Murphy cracked a couple of Sleeping Beauty jokes, but Raven knew how much could go wrong, and how easy it would be for the whole ship to burst into dust while they were asleep. She had nothing against going out that way – quick and painless seemed like a natural choice when it comes to dying – but they had overcome so much by that point. It would have been a waste not to see it through.

Shaw came over just as she was climbing up into her pod. She laid down on the surprisingly comfortable surface, refusing to let anyone see just how terrified she was of never getting out. Except he took one look at her and immediately reached for her trembling hand, covering it with his larger, rougher one. His thumb brushed soothingly over her wrist as he leaned over her. ‘It’s quicker than falling asleep,’ he said, low enough so that no one else could hear.

‘I suppose I could use a nap,’ she said, keeping the tone light, strangely grateful that he didn’t offer empty promises about the waking up part. His mouth twitched. His eyes were warm and hopeful and just serious enough to make her feel better about the growing tightness in her chest. He knew the risks better than anyone.

He let go of her hand and stepped back, reaching for the controls. Her wrist felt cold as it adjusted to the sudden absence of his touch.

‘Close your eyes.’

She took a deep breath and did as he said, resigned to the darkness, her heart slamming against her chest.

His voice was suddenly right by her ear. ‘See you in the morning,’ he whispered, and then the hatch closed and she was plunged into darkness.

Now, six hours - or hundred and twenty-five years, depending on who you ask – later, she comes up to his pod, presses the necessary buttons, and holds her breath as he slides out of the chamber, the glass lid lifting and revealing his peaceful sleeping form.

One moment, two, three.

He blinks awake. His mouth stretches into a smile when he sees her, his eyes alight with relief.

‘Good morning,’ she says, with more confidence than she feels, her hand coming up to tuck a strand of hair behind her air. She can see the exact moment his eyes pick up on the tremble of her hand and the tension in her shoulders. He raises himself up to his elbows, head moving from left to right as he quickly takes in his surroundings.

‘Where is everyone?’ He asks, a frown forming on his face, worry seeping into his low, raspy voice. The room and the adjoined hallway are eerily empty, since the few passengers who are awake currently occupy the bridge.

‘Just a few of us are awake right now,’ she says, carefully watching his expression change as she delivers the news. She’d prefer to ease him into it. However, he seems to realize something’s off, so her plan falls into water pretty much immediately.

He sounds calm on the surface, but she senses the tension radiating off him. ‘Raven, how long has it been?’

‘Hundred and twenty-five years.’

His eyes widen, and for a moment he doesn’t say anything, just stays completely still as he takes it all in.

‘Okay,’ he finally says, nodding slightly to himself, before he sits up and swings his legs over the edge of his pod. They’re face to face now, and she wants to reach out and touch him, feel his steady pulse under her fingertips. But it’s been hundred and twenty-five years. He kissed her, yes, after she let her impulses get the better of her, but that was with a war raging on all around them and lives in imminent danger. That was with bodies running on nothing but a few remaining hopes and pure adrenaline. So, she keeps her hands at her sides, curling them into fists when she realizes they are still trembling.

He tilts his head, his piercing gaze never leaving her eyes as he reaches for her hand and brushes his thumb over her knuckles, so gentle and soft that she has to swallow a newly formed lump in her throat. ‘What’s wrong, Raven?’

Everything. Everything’s wrong.

She looks down at where their hands are suspended in the air, fingers intertwined, and takes a deep breath. ‘I’ve got something to show you.’ She tugs on his hand and pulls him off his pod. ‘Come.’

He follows her to the observation deck in silence, their footsteps echoing as they weave their way through long empty hallways. His presence is warm and solid behind her back, but she doesn’t allow herself to stop, and she doesn’t let go off his hand.

She leads them through the last doorway and his step falters. She turns just in time to see his lips part and his eyes widen, his stunned expression illuminated by the warm glow of the two suns. He takes it all in with eyes full of wonder, and then turns to her, brow furrowing as he starts to realize what it all means.

She lets go off his hand and walks over to the window, his footsteps following behind her. She tells him everything about the planet that was too far gone, the new one below them, and how Monty spent his whole life trying to save them all.

_This is our last chance, Raven._

_I’m counting on you._

That’s when it finally sinks in.

Monty and Harper are gone.

Her voice breaks, just slightly, right after she thinks she made it through. She had to be strong in front of Bellamy because he needed her, and because he’s the one always taking care of everyone, always the one to take the burden onto himself. Now he’s thrust into that role again, except on an infinitely larger scale. A spaceship full of deeply divided people and a planet they know nothing about, but is all they have left.

It doesn’t matter that neither of them can breathe. Saving the human race doesn’t stop just because two of its members are gone. The Universe doesn’t mourn.

Maybe it should. Just this once.

She knows she should be heading straight for the bridge. She should be running around right this second, double-checking every screw, combing through the incoming data, running simulations, but she. Can’t. Breathe.

Because Monty and Harper are gone. And they’re not coming back.

‘Raven,’ a soft voice brings her out of her thoughts, and then there’s a hand gently reaching for her elbow. He pulls her in, tucks her head under his chin, his arms wrapped all around her and holding her close. That’s when she loses any semblance of control.

She presses her face into his firm chest, her hands sliding around his waist, up his back, then hooking over his shoulders as she tries to hold on. A scream builds deep inside her chest, surges up her throat, demands to be released. She opens her mouth, but no sound comes out, her body shuddering from a silent sob that almost splits her in half. She. Can’t. Breathe.

‘It’s okay,’ he murmurs into her hair, his thumb rubbing circles against her back, and she freezes. How can it be okay?

Monty and Harper are dead.

His hands release the grip on her back and come up to cup her cheeks, forcing her to look up at him, pressing their foreheads together. He delivers each word with conviction, ‘It’s okay to let it out.’

His eyes are dark and sad, and they notice every twitch of her muscles, read every thought that crosses her mind. She tastes salt on her lips from her own tears.

She wraps her hands around his him, her heart raw, overwhelmed by a sense of relief and gratitude. She hides her face in the crook of his neck and releases a large pent-up breath. His lips press against her temple, so gently that she thinks she imagined it. He doesn’t offer the customary empty words of comfort. Instead, she listens to the soothing murmur of his voice as he methodically goes through what system diagnostics need to be run and what onboard equipment to use for planet analysis, somehow guessing that it will help ease her mind. Strangely, it does, and she’s not sure what to think once she figures out _why_.

Ever since she first landed on Earth and got sucked into one war after another, she’s always been working against the clock, pretending the weight of everyone’s expectations doesn’t get to her, soldiering on through pain and loss, simply because there was no other option. They always looked to her for a solution, for a way out, for a plan that keeps them alive.

But now he’s here, and he knows exactly what needs to be done. He did it before.

All of which means –

she doesn’t have to do it alone, not anymore.

-

Murphy raises his eyebrows when he sees them come in through the doorway. ‘Oh, so we’re just waking people willy-nilly?’

Raven feels Shaw tense beside her as everyone turns to look at them. Bellamy, Emori, Echo and Jordan are gathered around a screen with several opened files. Murphy’s lounging in a chair next to them, one leg dangling over its arm as he swivels from left to right, playing with a small bouncy ball he found God knows where. Clarke’s on the other side of the room, facing the window, watching them out of the corner of her eye.

Bellamy gives Murphy a pointed look. ‘He’s the second most qualified person in this room.’

‘Don’t worry, pilot,’ Murphy grins, throwing the ball at Shaw who instinctively catches it with his hands. ‘I’m just messing with you.’

Raven narrows her eyes at Murphy in a silent warning and he raises his hands in surrender. ‘Relax, I forgave him for the torture part. It’s ancient history, literally.’

Perched on the table, Emori rolls her eyes, a fond look on her face. ‘It’s been seven hours.’ Standing next to her, Echo stifles a snort.

‘Good morning?’ Shaw tries, one hand raised in hello and the other fidgeting with the ball, glancing around as he gauges the mood in the room. Raven places what she hopes is an encouraging hand on his forearm.

Bellamy gives him an easy smile, motioning at him to come inside. ‘I hope you slept well, we’ve got a lot of work to do.’

Seeing her family interact with him this easily brings her an unexpected amount of relief, and a warm feeling she knows better than to examine right now. He seems to have already earned Bellamy’s seal of approval, so that’s one down, five to go.

Monty and Harper are gone.

_Three to go._

Raven squashes a surge of emotions before they can take over and watches as Jordan comes forward, excitedly offering his hand to Shaw. ‘So, I’ve been told this was your ship?’

Before Shaw even opens his mouth, she cuts in, jumping at the chance to lighten the mood and distract herself from the tightness in her chest. ‘Well, _technically_ , I hacked into it, so…‘

‘That’s not how that works,’ Shaw turns to her, fondness in his eyes taking her by surprise. ‘And, in any case, I hacked back into it-’

She grins, triumphant. ‘Aha! So you admit it was mine.’

He shakes her head, mouth twitching upwards, and turns his attention back to Jordan. ‘It was my ship, yes. I see your family took great care of it, thank you.’ Shaw sweeps his gaze over the interior, then focuses back on Jordan. ‘And I’m sorry about your parents.’

Jordan nods, the loss still too recent for him to manage anything else, and then offers to show Shaw and Raven the available data on the planet.

Raven flashes him a smile, hands itching to get to work. ‘Alright, kid, let’s see what you got.’

-

Raven squints at the screen, blinking as her eyes struggle to focus on raw data evaluating the state of the hythylodium processing tank number twenty-seven. She stretches her neck muscles, wincing at the stiffness in her back. Her leg has started to protest hours ago.

Shaw turns slightly in the chair next to her, gaze flicking from her face to the way she tries to discreetly roll her shoulders in an attempt to relieve some of her discomfort. She goes still, then turns to face him. Her eyes dare him to suggest she needs to rest.  

‘Here, I’ll trade you,’ he says instead, and a couple of keyboard clicks later an infinitely more interesting orbital simulation pops up on her screen, while the file she was working on appears on his. She knows that the exhaustion is really getting to her when she almost grabs him by the collar and plants a grateful kiss on his lips right there and then.

But then his fingers still over the keyboard and she realizes she celebrated too soon.

‘Or you could, you know, take a break?’

Raven groans inwardly. It’s been an ongoing struggle. He glanced at her every time she slipped up and showed the smallest sign of discomfort, but didn’t try to make her stop, only transferred a useful reference sheet onto her screen or slid a bottle of water her way, knowing that she needs something to do, a problem to work on. She’s noticed him shift in his seat a couple of times too, when he thought she wasn’t looking. His almost unnatural ability to sit still with his back completely straight for hours on end almost fooled her. Almost.

Makes her remember the military rank Diyoza used even after he went behind her back. _Lieutenant_.

‘I’ll take a break when you take a break,’ she says stubbornly, and he lifts his hands from the keyboard, smiling like he’s won.

‘Fine,’ he calls her bluff. ‘Let’s take a break.’

‘We can’t do that before we make sure we’re not seconds away from blowing up in space.’

‘So, we’re never taking a break then?’ Jordan mutters under his breath from his seat down the line, and Raven has to suppress a smile. The kid’s been nothing but enthusiastic since the moment they started, brimming with excitement at the prospect of getting to know characters from his bedtime stories, but it looks like hours of mind-numbing data evaluation have finally begun to wear on him.

She glances at the clock. The three of them have spent more than twelve hours going through status reports, assessing the steadily incoming telemetry and the ship’s overall condition. Emori volunteered to do a manual sweep through the life-support systems, and Murphy went along with her. She kept them updated over the radio until about an hour ago, when she announced she’s going to get something to eat. Raven hasn’t seen any of the others since the morning, other than when Bellamy came in to borrow Jordan and then sent him back with several portions of freshly harvested algae.

‘Go get some rest, Jordan,’ Shaw says, and it comes out more as an order than a suggestion. Jordan’s shoulders sag in relief, just a bit, even as he nervously glances at Raven.

She wants to hit herself on the head when she realizes that the poor kid has been working himself to death because he was afraid to disappoint them. And he’s just lost his parents, too. ‘Of course, go. We’ll finish up here and turn in too.’

‘If you guys are sure,’ Jordan frowns, still hesitant, and Raven waves her arm towards the door, smiling.

‘Yes, go,’ she assures him, and he finally agrees.

‘Okay, but, if you need anything, give me a shout.’

Raven nods and watches him disappear into the hallway, biting her tongue to hold back the thought that crossed her mind. _Just like his father._

When she swivels back to her work, Shaw’s regarding her with a thoughtful expression.

‘He seems like a good guy,’ he says, careful, and a pang of pain hits her chest, spreading far and wide as she remembers who made him that.

‘He had great parents.’

She leans her elbows against the table, pressing the heels of her hands against her eyes, waiting for the swirl of emotions to pass. Shaw’s eyes are on her as she sinks back into her chair, all of a sudden feeling completely drained.

‘Let’s take a break,’ she says, surprising both him and herself.

‘Okay.’

-

Raven has been to exactly one funeral in her life, back on the Ark, and she still sees it in her dreams from time to time. She didn’t want to care that her mother was gone, and yet - she still sometimes does.

Jordan told them there are more videos, of modest birthday celebrations and mundane joyful moments. So, after they’re done with the most pressing tasks for the day, they pull the videos up on the big screen in the mess hall and gather in the padded seating area in the corner. Their hearts are heavy, both because they’re about to see just how much of their friends’ lives they missed, and because in the back of their minds they know that tomorrow none of the decisions they postponed making can’t be ignored anymore.

But for now, they sit down and play the first video.

It’s not exactly a funeral, but she knows Monty and Harper wouldn’t want one, anyway. They would prefer a tree to be planted in the soil on the new planet, a seed of the new life they gave all of them. But since there’s no way to do that right now, they’ll have to settle for this.

Raven takes a seat between Bellamy and Murphy, links arms with them as Monty and Harper come to life on the screen, just slightly older than they would have been now had they gone to sleep like they were supposed to.

They laugh together, they make smartass comments directed at their friends and wink at the camera straight after. They sit in silence, they cry from joy at the small bundle of blankets in their hands, they run after a surprisingly fast toddler and then a couple of years later bring him up to the camera to show Uncle Murphy the monster he created from algae. Each time a new video loads there are more visible marks of the passing time, lines carved in skin and hair turning grey. Over the years their eyes are happy, worried, smiling, resigned, content, proud.

They never once show regret.

The last video ends, and no one speaks for a very long time.

A soft sniff breaks the silence, and Raven turns her head to see Bellamy bringing his arm around Jordan’s shoulders, squeezing tight.

There are signs of their friends everywhere around them. The algae farm, strong and thriving. Small lines on the doorway marking Jordan’s height at different ages. The fact that they are alive to see it all.  

This is it, she thinks, looking from Murphy’s heartbroken expression to Bellamy’s tear-stained face. The last ones standing. Who would have thought?

She knows Clarke’s still here, and Miller and Octavia are sleeping in their pods, none the wiser. But they don’t really count, not anymore. What’s six months on the ground compared to six years on the Ring? They weren’t there when Murphy almost died, when Monty broke down once he finally opened his eyes. The allegiances shifted, priorities changed, and things will never be the same again. The people who they used to be may as well be buried under dirt and ashes on the Earth light-years away from here.

Her eyes seek out Shaw without realizing and meet his across the room. He’s in one of the chairs by the table, expression tightly controlled. She realizes that, out of everyone, he probably knows the most about loss and being reborn. He doesn’t have anyone from Before to hold onto.

‘I think I’m gonna go to bed,’ Jordan suddenly says, standing up, and Bellamy immediately frowns.

‘You can stay here with us, if you want.’

Jordan shakes his head, wiping the tears from his face with the back of his hand. ‘I think I want to be alone right now. It’s okay. You guys have a good night.’

‘Alright,’ Bellamy says, leaning back into his seat, even though he’s still not entirely convinced. ‘You know where to find us if you need anything.’

Jordan nods, retreating into the hallway with a hand raised in good-bye.

‘I’m gonna turn in too,’ Clarke says shortly after, rising from the chair in the back. She looks like she’s not sure of anything anymore, let alone where and with whom she’s supposed to be spending the night.  

‘You don’t have to go.’ Bellamy says, his tone casual, but Raven can feel his shoulders tense. She honestly has no clue what kind of answer he’s looking for. It’s possible he doesn’t know that himself.

Clarke glances around the room, her gaze lingering on Raven.

Raven pretends she doesn’t notice. She can't look at Clarke without remembering the pain. 

‘No, I- I do.’

Murphy leans forward like he wants to say something, maybe, but before he can, Clarke’s already gone. Raven’s not sure if she imagines Bellamy’s shoulders lower almost imperceptibly in relief.

Silence settles among them, stretching on almost uncomfortably until Emori decides to diffuse the tension by making everyone either grimace or laugh.

‘Have I ever told you guys about that one time I walked in on Harper and Monty in the shower?’

As she begins to tell the story, her voice, along with the elicited chuckles, fills out the large room, making it feel just a bit less cold and empty. Raven relaxes back against the seat, realizing just how tired she is all of a sudden. She closes her eyes, just for a moment, and when she opens them again Shaw has come up to crouch by her feet, telling her in a quiet voice that he’ll go get some sleep while their orbital simulations are still running. She wants to protest him going anywhere, but her limbs are heavy, and her leg has been hurting like a bitch for hours. The smooth cushioned surface looks inviting, so she lies down on her side, coming face to face with him. There’s a light sprinkle of freckles on his nose, and a small scar right above his eyebrow. He’s watching her with an intensity she feels down to her bones.

He starts to rise to his feet and she catches him by his wrist, holding his gaze until he lowers himself back to the ground. He stretches his legs out down on the floor and props his arm against the seat, right by the top of her head.

He doesn’t say anything, and neither does she.

She lets the steady rise and fall of his chest lull her to sleep.

-

_She’s strapped to something - a chair, maybe a wall. She can’t move._

_A limp hand hangs over the edge of a metal table, just out of her reach. Slowly, menacingly, a dark figure comes out from the shadows. Raven opens her mouth to scream in warning, but no sound comes out._

_Every single nerve in her body lights on fire, like a thousand small paper cuts opened up all over her body, all at once. Shock waves run through her, stinging and burning until she can’t think anymore, can’t focus on anything but the pain searing through her cramped muscles. Her blood is acid, intent on destroying her from the inside out. Finally, the torture stops, allowing her one fleeting moment of relief before she jerks forward, against her constraints, gagging from a sudden bout of nausea. She can’t take it anymore. What do they want from her?_

_Radio crackles in the distance with gunshots and cries. The body writhes on the table, frantic, yelling, scared. She is stuck._

_Click of a gun pressed against her temple._

_Choose._

_She gasps for air, tears running down her face._

_Choose._

Raven jolts awake, chest heaving as her heartbeat pounds in her head.

The air is cold. The lights are dimmed. She sits up, a blanket that wasn’t there when she fell asleep sliding down her body and pooling around her waist.

She reaches around her and finds empty space. She glances around the room, relief settling in as she finds her family splayed over the seats and the floor in the darkness, sleeping peacefully. The ship hums in the background, and Echo’s soft snores periodically disrupt stillness of the room.

But he’s not here.

She pushes the blanket aside and gets up to her feet before she even realizes what she’s doing. Her leg protests, but she barely notices, venturing determinedly into the eerily empty hallway.

She peers into each room on her way, eyes searching for the familiar set of shoulders inside the cramped crew quarters and the adjacent small gym. Her path is lined with dimmed fluorescent lights that give everything a cold, bluish tint. One panel flickers right above her when she steps onto the bridge, looking for him among the lit screens which are still running lines of code. Red digits on the wall show 4:02. He’s not here either.

She pulls her bottom lip between her teeth, trying to think of a place he could have went to. She follows the hallways leading deeper into the ship, slightly on edge as her gaze sweeps over unfamiliar shapes in the darkness.  

She finally finds him all the way on the other side of the ship, in a small room with a large window looking out to the blackness outside. It’s so dark that she just barely recognizes the outline of a few metal cabinets, and a bench pushed against the wall on her left. He’s sitting on the bench, back against the wall, hauntingly still, staring into space. His boot-clad feet are balanced on its metal edge, knees almost pressed against his chest.

The sight of him sitting alone in the darkness stirs something inside her, urging her to act.

‘Hey,’ she says softly, not wanting to startle him. He doesn’t move a muscle, like he’s heard her approach from a mile away, on alert even in the middle of a ship with all its inhabitants currently asleep. She briefly wonders if it’s possible to get the drop on him. ‘Is everything okay?’

As she comes further inside, soft light falls on his face and reveals his pensive expression. His skin is illuminated by the bluish glow of the narrow LED panels lining the walls.

‘Yeah, I was just-’ he starts, his voice slightly hoarse, then finally looks up at her, brow creasing in concern. ‘Why are you up?’

Her mind flashes with the image of the lifeless hand from her dream, which looked terrifyingly like the one that’s currently resting against his knee. She can almost feel the cold muzzle of the gun on her temple.

‘Woke up and you weren’t there.’

His eyes grow softer, clearer, and she moves closer, lowering herself next to him on the bench. Their shoulders are almost touching. If she slid her hand just a bit to the left over the smooth metal surface, her fingers would brush against his.

She notices he’s got something in his hand, the one that’s rested against his knee. He follows the direction of her gaze and then uncurls his hand, revealing a small silver badge in the shape of wings, a single star raised in the center.

‘I couldn’t sleep so I went to my old room,’ he says, flicking the wings between his fingers. ‘These were still in the locker next to my bunk.’ His eyes stare at the badge for a long moment before he wills his gaze away. ‘Though I did find this too.’ He reaches into his pocket and hands her a folded paper, its edges slightly frayed.

Once she carefully unfolds it, her first instinct is to smile. It’s a child’s drawing of the Earth and a spaceship heading straight for it. Familiar faces wave from the windows, each with a corresponding name written in wonky capital letters. Mom and dad. Uncle Bellamy. Aunt Raven. Their whole family. Even Shaw got a shout-out, sitting in the front in a green uniform with the same badge that he’s now flicking between his fingers.

She feels his gaze on him, and lifts her head, letting her eyes show how much she appreciates him showing her the drawing, even if it feels like her heart has been ripped out of her chest.

Her finger ghosts over the slightly smudged outline of the Earth, and that’s when it finally dawns on her why Shaw chose to come all this way to this exact spot in the middle of the night. She looks up at the twisted, warped shapes that the stars make against the blackness outside and for the first time she doesn’t see them as glimmers of hope that promise a better tomorrow. She looks out and sees a reminder of everything that’s been lost. Everything the yesterday should have been.  

If her quick, sleepy-eyed calculations are correct, this side of the ship should be facing the general direction of the now deserted Solar System.

‘I was on a training exercise before my first deployment,’ he begins, staring into the distance, his wistful tone confirming her thoughts. ‘We’d gone on a six-hour patrol in the dead of night, then came back and slept in a tent without any heat because our stove was broken. It was getting down to -20 degrees, and this guy, Adam, kept complaining about how he’ll get frostbite on his ass.’ He smiles at the memory before his eyes turn sad, the small silver wings disappearing in his closed fist. ‘It was one of our most miserable nights out in the field, but right now I miss every single moment of it.’

Her heart aches as the meaning behind his words sinks in. She feels helpless, her mind scrambling to think of a single thing to say. She sets the drawing aside, her worry growing from the way he clenches his fist around the badge hard enough for his knuckles to turn white.

He shakes his head and relaxes his grip, just a little. ‘I can’t believe I’ll never see it again.’

She knows what he means by _it_. The Earth. _Home_.

His next words strike deep inside her chest. ‘I woke up and for a split second I thought I was done with the mission and on my way home. Then I remembered.’

_There is no home anymore._

‘Shaw, I-‘

‘Zeke.’

She tilts her head, confused, so he clarifies.

‘That’s what everyone called me. Before.’

‘Zeke,’ she tries out the name, testing how it feels coming out of her lips. Judging by the way his eyes light up, he likes it.

She does, too.

She inches closer to him, her fingers brushing against his on the bench. Both of their gazes are drawn to where her fingers card through his, melding like they make a perfect whole. There’s nothing she can say that will ease his pain, but she can do this.

She traces the calluses along his slender fingers, lingers on the small scar on his thumb. The darkness backs away just a little bit each time she discovers a new line on his palm. He seems calmer now, more grounded, tension dissipating from his body in slow, steady waves. He brings their intertwined hands up against his chest, lowers his head to press his cheek against them.

The brush of his lips against the back of her hand feels like a little touch of heaven. Warm, together, safe.

‘You really should go back to sleep,’ he murmurs, setting their hands back on the bench between them, giving her an easy out.

She doesn’t want one.

‘I’ll sleep when you sleep,’ she echoes her own words from before, but they come out infinitely softer now. She draws nearer and slowly, carefully, lays her head on his shoulder, her free hand wrapping around his arm. She can feel his lips stretch into a smile against her temple.

He relaxes against the wall behind his back, allowing her to melt even more into him. Her eyelids grow heavier with each second, exhaustion catching up with her. For a fleeting moment she panics at the thought of going back to her nightmares, but then he tightens the grip on her hand and tucks it away in his lap.

‘Okay,’ he whispers, and, just like that, she knows that the nightmares won’t return tonight, not while he’s here. ‘Let’s sleep.’

**Author's Note:**

> Just a warning, I've got a lot to say now that this is finally finished. Buckle up, kids.
> 
> First of all, this fic started out as a short & simple s6 speculation thing and then quickly spiraled out of control. I should know by now that I can't do *short & simple* to save my life. I've already got more written, including many scenes focused on Raven and Zeke and their growing bond. I'm just not sure yet how I want to proceed, since I'm reluctant to start a multi-chaptered fic right now, and not enthusiastic in the slightest about cramming new characters into the show's story (even less about the potential Aliens™). Maybe I'll do a couple of one-shot style sequels focusing just on Raven and Zeke, we'll see.
> 
> Second of all, writing this story was An Experience, to say the least. I looked up available information on Shaw's background to help me flesh out his character and some of it just doesn't add up. Before I knew it, I'd already spent way too much time looking into US military branches, next-generation fighter jets, and memes on the US Air Force subreddit. I kept stressing myself out trying to come up with a plausible explanation for all the skills & knowledge they gave him, but by that point I realized that I had probably already put more thought into his character than the show writers ever will. So I decided to mostly wing it. Besides, it's all supposed to be happening in the future anyway. (Note that this will apply more to the future installments of the story.)
> 
> I'm looking forward to hearing your thoughts! This whole fic was born out of a) my eternal love and appreciation of Raven Reyes, b) my need for more Raven/Zeke interaction and c) my frustration with the widespread idea that, after all is said and done at the end of s5, everything would somehow be magically forgiven & forgotten - it just doesn't seem plausible to me at all. I know that this show is extremely plot-driven, but sooner or later characters have to sit down and start dealing with everything they've done to each other, damn it.
> 
> One last thing - my dumb laptop kept trying to correct McCreary into Creamery. Just thought I'd let you know. It was the only bright point of editing this monster of a story.
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> tl;dr: The story will be continued, I'm just not sure yet whether it will be in the form of chapters or separate one-shots. Thanks for reading and feel free to share your thoughts below!


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